


From Hoboken to Spokane

by Amerna



Series: The Long Goodbye [1]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Gen, Grief/Mourning, Not Avengers:Endgame compliant, Road Trips
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-07-21
Updated: 2019-08-06
Packaged: 2020-07-10 06:15:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 13,335
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19901140
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Amerna/pseuds/Amerna
Summary: “We should take him on a trip,” Bucky says hoarsely.“What?” Sam furrows his brow.“Steve has never seen the US,” Bucky explains, “well, has neverreallyseen them,” he amends. “We should take him from Hoboken to Spokane.”aka the one where Steve dies and Bucky and Sam take his ashes on a cross-country road trip





	1. Part I

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Em_Jaye](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Em_Jaye/gifts).



> Hi everyone!
> 
> This is my NaNo story from last year. I was convinced that Steve would not survive Endgame and tried to figure out what Bucky and Sam would do. At some point in the past, Sebastian Stan had mentioned that he and Mackie should do a version of "Weekend At Bernie's" with Steve's body and, thanks to Em_Jaye, it was downhill from there :D
> 
> If you're interested in following their travels, [here's a map.](https://drive.google.com/open?id=1NK1pncXrihIlyKXlKgGQq3vPVPhJpBrd&usp=sharing)

### Part I

Per Wakandan custom, Shuri explains, the dead are burned and their ashes are scattered on their tribal homeland so they can reach out with both hands for Bast and Sekhmet who will lead them into the green veld where they can run forever.

It sounds peaceful, Sam thinks, as he watches the flames consume Steve’s body, Steve deserves that. He immediately corrects himself. No, Steve deserves so much more than that, he deserves to live and run forever, but that wasn’t meant to be.

He looks around, at the stone-faced people surrounding him. Everything still feels raw and unreal. They won, but by what means Sam isn’t quite sure. Natasha has tried to explain, that it involved time travel and alternate time strings and they it took them a year to figure out, but Sam hasn’t had time to wrap his head around it. He knows that things are different. Tony is here for once, as are Clint and Scott, and he has no idea how they got here. There are people from outer space, aliens, here that helped them win the battle, but one thing remains: Steve and Vision are no longer there.

He still hasn’t processed it though.

And the US government doesn’t give him any further chance. A US military envoy arrives the next day and things spiral out of his control.

The absence of any help from the most militarized nation on earth in the face of extraterrestrial attacks had been galling. But then the US Government had disappointed them time and time again in the last two years, Sam thinks bitterly.

What remains of the Avengers greets them with open hostility. The head of the envoy exchanges only a few words with them, promising help with their repatriation, before he requests a meeting with T’Challa. A few hours later, T’Challa calls them into his private study.

“They want Captain Rogers’s remains,” T’Challa announces without warning.

“No,” Sam immediately says. “No way.”

“They wanted him brought back to the US,” T’Challa continues.

“Just Steve?” Natasha wants to know. “What about Vision?”

“Captain Rogers is all they care about.”

“What for?” Sam asks suspiciously. “What do they want to do with his body? Did you tell them that he was cremated already?”

“I did. They simply want his remains. There are plans for him to be buried with the highest honors.”

Sam laughs humorlessly. “Fuck them.”

“The US has always considered Steve’s body their property,” Bucky says quietly, for which Sam looks at him sharply.

“News must have leaked,” Tony throws in, “or they will leak. And they want to save face, since they really did nothing to-”

“What will they do if we say no?” Natasha asks impatiently.

T’Challa thinks for a moment. “Probably create an international incident,” he says, “but we can handle it.”

“What do they offer for us to say yes?” Bucky asks.

“They are offering all of you full immunity,” T’Challa tells them, “and the suspension of the enforcement of the Accords until a better agreement can be found. You would be free to return to your home and would no longer have to fear imprisonment and prosecution.”

They’re all quiet for a moment. Sam sees that this is a tempting offer but he’s about to open his mouth to say that they should decline when Bucky speaks up.

“I think we should release them,” he says.

“What?!” Sam grouses.

“It’s just,” Bucky shrugs, his face expressionless, “his physical remains.”

“I agree,” Natasha says and Sam wheels around to stare at her too. “There is really no need to create an international incident over this. Steve would not have wanted it.”

“Is this the shock talking?” Sam asks in disbelief. “You’re not serious, are you?”

“We’ll say goodbye,” Bucky says, “that’s more than I ever expected anyway. The manner of his burial shouldn’t matter.”

“He’s no longer there,” Nat adds forcefully. “We have to say goodbye somehow.”

“No,” Sam objects immediately. “No, absolutely not. We don’t even know if we can trust the US government, think about that. They might not keep their end of the bargain.”

He looks at Tony, Bruce and Clint, who had been suspiciously quiet about this. “What about you guys?”

Tony remains silent and refuses to meet Sam’s gaze. It’s Bruce who finally speaks up. “You three are his closest friends. You should make the decision.”

“You’re leaving me to be overruled by these two jokers here?” Sam asks in disbelief. “You know Steve, he would hate it, his remains being used for political purposes. He wouldn’t want an entire state funeral or whatever. That’s not him.”

“Steve is an idealist,” Clint points out. “He always puts his own wishes last, behind the common good. That’s why he-” Clint stops himself but everybody knew what he had almost said.

“What the fuck.” Sam doesn’t even bother to hide his outrage.

“How much time do we have to make a decision?” Bucky asks.

“Until tomorrow,” T’Challa replies.

Bucky stares at Sam. “We can still discuss this,” he tells him. “Maybe we should sleep on it.”

“I’m not discussing anything with you guys. Steve is- he’s- he’s dead,” Sam says, his throat suddenly constricting. “And I’m not letting anybody him turn into a spectacle.”

~*~

One thing hasn’t changed in the two years since Sam last set foot on US soil: Dulles is still the worst.

The flight has been exhausting and somewhat eerie. It’s the first day that air travel has resumed after all planes had been downed in the wake of the attack. Sam has been lucky to catch a flight from Nairobi to Paris and from there to DC.

He’d imagined his return to DC, to US soil, differently. He thought he’d no longer be a wanted criminal for once. He’d also loved the idea of his parents picking him up from the airport. But that all doesn’t work. He doesn’t even notify his family of his return, just to be safe, and he’s not planning on staying long enough for a visit anyway. He told them immediately after the attack that he was safe and unharmed.

The entire world seems to be in a state of shock but also on the verge of moving on. Sam keeps his head down. He’s confident that he will not be recognized because he has always been one of the more obscure Avengers, keeping out of the spotlight, but some of the habits he has developed while being a fugitive are hard to shake. He also isn’t even sure if he still was a fugitive. Sure, the US government has promised that Team Cap would no longer be fugitives in exchange for Steve’s remains, but he has no idea when that will become effective – or if they’ll even keep their word. He hasn’t stuck around long enough to find out the particulars or the deal that Bucky and Nat made on all of their behalf. At this point he has enough false passports to enter the US a hundred times over.

Sam is making his way through the arrival hall when he hears Steve’s name spoken. He looks up and sees that CNN is playing on all screens in the vicinity. The ribbon at the bottom of the screen announce that they are live at Joint Base Andrews where the remains of Captain Steve Rogers, better known as Captain America, will arrive any minute now.

“Can you explain what is going to happen?” Brianna Keilar asks the correspondent on site.

“Upon arrival, he will be greeted with a gun salute,” the correspondent declares, “and his flag-draped casket will be carried from the plane by an honor guard. It will be transported to the Capitol a few hours later and he will lie in state tomorrow to give the citizens the chance to pay tribute to the nation’s most eminent hero. The funeral will happen the day after.”

“This is quite a quick turnaround for planning an entire state funeral – the first non-presidential one in 50 years for that matter.”

“Plans for his state funeral were first drawn up when Captain Rogers went missing in 1945 under orders from then-President Roosevelt. President Ellis simply confirmed them two days ago. The fact that Captain Rogers would be granted the additional honor to lie in state was announced by the Senate Majority Leader in coordination with congressional leaders from both parties.”

“Now there are rumors that Captain Rogers already given a ‘warrior’s sendoff’ in Wakanda per their local custom. Any thoughts on that?”

“Very little is known about Wakandan customs or Captain Rogers’s life in the last few years. There certainly are rumors that he had chosen the African nation as his adopted country but nothing has been confirmed. All we know is that he died-”

Sam quickly turns around to make his way to the exit.

~*~

The queue outside the Capitol stretches 17 blocks. Sam is in line at 7:59pm. The official announcement has promised that people in line by 8pm will be able to enter the Capitol to pay their respects and for his plan to work Sam needs to disappear into a crowd but then needed them all to leave as fast as possible.

The person in front of him is watching the news on her phone. When General Ross comes on for an interview with Anderson Cooper, she mumbles a quiet but passionate “he’s the worst” and Sam can’t help but snort. It’s a beginner’s mistake, he shouldn’t draw attention to himself, he knows that, but when she looks up at him and moves her phone so he can follow the interview, he can’t help but look at the screen in front of him.

“From what we’ve heard, none of the other Avengers, his comrades in arms, are actually attending the funeral,” Anderson Cooper says.

“Some of them are injured and recuperating from their own wounds,” Secretary Ross lies smoothly. “And his friends have already said goodbye in a private ceremony. This is to give the nation the opportunity to say goodbye to one of its greatest heroes.”

Anderson Cooper looks like he has to try very hard to not roll his eyes at that. “Now, correct me if I’m wrong, Secretary Ross, but wasn’t Captain Rogers dishonorably discharged after he was branded a criminal and a fugitive two years ago? Lying in State is only available for government officials and military officers. So how come Captain Rogers is being granted this great honor since he was neither at the time of his death?” There’s a noticeable tick in Ross’s jaw even though he maintains his neutral facial expression. “Or was the announcement incorrect and he is to lie in honor like Billy Graham last year?”

“Captain Rogers was posthumously reinstated to his old rank,” Ross answers through gritted teeth.

“So you’re saying you and the army made a mistake two years ago?”

Ross takes a deep breath. “We made the right choice based on the facts that were available to us at that time. We have now updated our assessment.”

“But the army doesn’t usually do this,” Anderson Cooper presses on. “We certainly tried to find a similar case where this has happened and we came up empty.”

Sam had thought that Ross’s facial expression could turn any sourer, but he was wrong. “I think this is a very unique situation, certainly a situation without precedent. But let me remind you that this was a bipartisan decision.”

Anderson Cooper immediately jumps on that. “So you had to reinstate him because of pressure from the majority leader and the house speaker?”

“Of course not, we simply followed the instructions from President Roosevelt, who had the plans for the state funeral drawn up after Captain Rogers’ disappearance in 1945.”

“Now, I’m not saying that Captain Rogers doesn’t deserve this honor, he _is_ one of our greatest heroes and he made the ultimate sacrifice not only for our country but potentially to save the universe, but this whole spectacle kind of feels a little like a popularity contest. The President’s approval rating was at an all-time low last month and the numbers probably-”

“Anderson-” Ross tries to interrupt him unsuccessfully.

“-won’t improve in light of the inaction during the attack. And then of course there are these reports that Senator Schumer, who is responsible for Captain Rogers’s home state, lobbied for this most of all because he’s facing a tough primary challenge.”

Ross’s face is completely expressionless. “I can’t possibly comment on that.”

The interview ends soon after and the woman pockets her phone afterwards. “Ross is such a creep,” she tells Sam. “But it is kind of entertaining to have him bend over backwards on national TV to sing Captain America’s praises after basically portraying him as the devil incarnate for the last two years.”

“Yeah,” Sam says non-committally.

The line is moving slowly and by 10pm, Sam finally makes it onto the steps at the Capitol entrance. He blinks hard and tried not to look across the lawn to the place where he had first talked to Steve years ago.

When Sam finally makes it inside he looks around surreptitiously to find a spot where he can duck out of sight and wait until the building is mostly empty to steal Steve’s ashes. Security is tight, but he manages to find a corner he is pretty sure is a blind spot for three seconds when the officer from the Capitol police looks the other way.

He ducks under the rope and moves to hide behind a statue, when a strong arm grabs him by the shoulder and manhandles him through the closest door. Sam wheels around, ready to fight his attacker when he gets a look at his face and stopped short.

“Barnes?” Sam askes in disbelief.

“Shhhhhh,” Bucky shushes him. He puts one ear against the door of what Sam realizes is a supply closet to hear if there are any suspicious noises outside. When he’s apparently satisfied that they haven’t been caught, he straightens and looks at Sam.

“What the fuck are you doing here?” Sam whispers urgently.

“Same as you, probably,” Bucky says with a shrug, “liberating Steve.”

“You were planning this all along, weren’t you?” Sam realizes.

“Of course,” Bucky states like it as obvious. “But I didn’t want T’Challa to get caught up in it, not after everything he’s done for me. And really, the deal the US offered was quite good. I was good living in Wakanda, but I know that you have family you weren’t able to see in years. And then there’s Clint and Scott and Tony. I was trying to tell you about my plans but you were already gone.”

Sam lets out a breath he didn’t even realize he was holding. “Man, I was so mad at you because of… of your indifference and that you’d be willing to sell out so quickly. I’d thought that maybe Shuri had done something wrong with your brain and that you were now incapable of emotion.”

Bucky shakes his head. “No, I was just being… strategic. I would never leave Steve to these… these vultures.”

Sam nods and Bucky listens one more time for the noises outside. “How many were there behind you?” he asks.

“Not that many. Maybe 20 or so? They cut off the line 30 seconds after I made it.”

“They should be almost done with the visitors. Let’s give it maybe half an hour or so until the Capitol Police locks the place up.”

Sam nods. “How did you get here?” he asks into the silence a few minutes later.

“Snuck onto the plane carrying Steve here.”

“And you couldn’t steal him then?”

“Too many people around,” Bucky explains. “Do you have any ideas what to do after?”

“No,” Sam admits.

“Did you bring your car?” Bucky asks.

“What?” Sam stares at him in disbelief. “Of course not. First of all I no longer own a car because I was a fugitive for two years and the US government seized all my assets and second, while you were perfecting your artisanal goat cheese in Wakanda, I actually learned a thing or two about spycraft. So I would never be that stupid and bring my own car.”

Bucky looks taken aback at the force of Sam’s answer. “Sorry?” he says, a little unsure. “I didn’t mean it that way, I was just thinking, you know… maybe to take- take him- _Steve_ up to Brooklyn?”

“Oh,” Sam feels bad all of the sudden. “Yeah, that’s… that’s good. But we can handle the logistics after we’re out of here,” he offers.

Bucky is about to say something, when the door to the supply closet opens and Natasha slips in. Sam stares at her in surprise and is relieved to see that Bucky is doing the same. It’s comforting though that all three of them seem to have had the exact same idea.

“Hey boys,” she says, completely at ease, “while I love the male bonding that’s going on here, we should go.”

“But Steve-” Bucky begins and stops when Natasha places an urn in his hands.

“All settled,” she says. “They’ll throw the whole shebang tomorrow for a sack of sand.”

~*~

The follow Natasha to her car a few blocks from the Capitol. She hands the keys to Sam, embraces him and takes a step backwards. Sam looks at her quizzically.

“Come with us,” Bucky says, realizing that Natasha is saying goodbye and isn’t planning to come with them.

She turns around to look at him. “No… no.”

“Don’t you want to say goodbye?” he tries to cajole her.

Natasha swallows hard and looks at her feet. “I- I-,” she almost whispers, “I can’t bury him yet.”

“Then why did you steal him?”

“Because Steve hates the spectacle.”

“Nat-” Bucky begins, but she just squeezed his hand.

“I know.”

“Thank you.”

“It’s the last thing I could do for him,” Nat confesses, blinking furiously. It’s only the second time that Bucky sees her this… unguarded, her raw feelings on display. The first time was another lifetime ago. “You go bury him, just not,” she gestures around, “here. This is for Captain America… you need to do this last thing for _Steve_.”

“We will,” Sam promises.

“He believed in me,” she says. “He made me want to be better. He wasn’t there for my cynicism, for my dark outlook, for my isolation, for my sordid history… and when Steve Rogers believes in you, you stand taller, you believe that you’re more than what you think you are.”

~*~

They drive out of the city and take the interstate north through Maryland and then Pennsylvania. Twilight begins to set as they cross into New Jersey.

They are silent during the entire ride; Bucky looks out of the window, Steve’s urn is safely nestled in his lap.

They pass the first sign for Hoboken and suddenly Bucky can no longer breathe.

“Stop,” he manages to press out. “Stop the car now.”

“Wha-” Sam looks at him in surprise but something in Bucky’s expression makes him stop and he veers the car onto the shoulder. Bucky manages to hand the urn to Sam before he opens the car door, tumbles out onto the side of the road and drops to his knees. And suddenly he’s laughing and crying all at once, all because of that horrible song from 75 fucking years ago. Steve had travelled the US then, but Bucky wonders if Steve even knows the country, the people, he’s so stupidly devoted to. All Steve had probably ever gotten was a quick view, the clean, sanitized version during the USO tour before was always on one mission or the other, fighting one war and then the next.

And Bucky is having a fucking crying fit at the side of the road at 5 in the morning on the day his best friend is supposed to be buried with the highest honors, with all the bells and whistles, next to a car that contains said best friend’s stolen ashes, while other cars are speeding past on the interstate with the inhabitants knowing – maybe – that they’d lost Captain America, but having no idea that the loss of Steve Rogers is the thing that they should think about, the thing that will weigh heavier in years, decades to come.

And then Bucky doesn’t know if he’s crying for Steve or for himself or for both of them or for all of them because they’ve all lost Steve Rogers, one of the best persons in the world and there is nobody that can come after him.

He hears the other car door open and shut and then Sam is awkwardly standing over him.

“You okay, man?”

He looks up at Sam and suddenly Bucky knows what to do. “We should take him on a trip,” he says hoarsely.

“What?”

“We should take Steve’s ashes on a trip and scatter them where we think he would’ve liked it.”

Sam furrows his brow.

“Steve has never seen the US,” Bucky explains, “well, has never _really_ seen them,” he amends. “We should take him from Hoboken to Spokane.”

Sam grimaces. “That goddamn song, I swear-”

“Steve went on tour and that was the only time he got to explore and that’s not enough. He should see the people and the country.”

“Bucky-” Sam begins.

“You said yourself that you didn’t have any idea yet where to bury him.”

“And you suggested Brooklyn and that’s a good idea.”

“And now I’m suggesting something else. Steve never left specific instructions on where he wants to be buried or scattered. We should do what we think is right and I’m thinking we should leave pieces of him everywhere.”

Sam leans back against the car and scratched the back of his neck. “I don’t know,” he finally offers with raw honesty. “Let just find a place and think about it. Steve is not going anywhere.”

~*~

They stop at a 24-hour diner north of Newark and head to the booth in the farthest corner. A bright-eyed waitress offers them coffee, which they both accept. It feels weird to Sam to do this, sit in this strange place with a guy he doesn’t even particularly like with the stolen ashes of the one person that connects them in the trunk of their car. Thankfully Bucky has mostly recovered from his earlier outburst.

“Steve has actually seen the US,” Sam tells Bucky. “Well, some of it. He went on a road trip in 2012, shortly after the Battle of New York.”

“He never mentioned that,” Bucky says quietly.

“I’m not sure if it was really all that he’d hoped to be. He only mentioned it off-handedly a few times.”

“So it wasn’t a good trip then.”

“I didn’t say that,” Sam says defensively.

Bucky leans back against the upholstery and looks at Sam. “Why are you against this?” he asks, accusation in his tone. “We should take Steve on the road trip he should’ve had.”

Sam can think of a thousand arguments against this, most importantly that for black people cross-country road trips are a lot less fun. He can already foresee all the traffic stops he’ll have to endure. Instead he says, “I’m not, I just wanted to make sure that we’re considering all our options.”

“So what other options have you come up with?” Bucky challenges him sarcastically. “And if you don’t like the idea, you could just let me do this on my own.”

“I’m not letting Steve go,” Sam says forcefully, only grasping the double meaning of his words when Bucky looks at him pointedly.

“We need to, at some point,” Bucky says quietly, “and maybe a long goodbye is the way to go.”

They both fall quiet after that.

Sam doesn’t want to think about the nature of grief, about the last time he had to say goodbye to a friend in arms. “Where do you want to go?” he therefore asks Bucky.

“Don’t know yet,” Bucky says irritably. “We’ll just see where the journey takes us and find places Steve would like.”

“How long do you want to do that?”

“Do you have anything better to do?” Bucky challenges.

“Um… no.”

“Then let’s just go for it.”

Sam takes a deep breath. “Okay.”

~*~

“You’re a brainwashed ex-assassin. I’m not letting you drive.”

Bucky glares at Sam, but decides not to push it. Their trip hasn’t been up to an auspicious start anyway. After they’d both agreed that they should to do this, reality had set in quickly. Bucky would’ve loved to just start driving and put as many miles as possible between them and DC, but there were logistics to figure out first. Other than Natasha’s car – which Sam made sure to check that it wasn’t stolen – Bucky and Sam only have the clothes on their backs. Sam has an array of fake IDs while Bucky only has his Wakandan passport. Between them, they have a few hundred dollars, but not enough money to sustain a cross-country road trip.

For the lack of better option, they text Natasha and a few hours later, she answers with a location marker and an entry code. At the safe house, they find money, credit cards, and paperwork waiting for them.

Their first day of driving through Pennsylvania towards Lake Erie passes in stony silence until they get into an argument about music choices when Bucky turns on the car radio to make the silence feel less oppressive.

When they arrive in Erie, they find a place to sleep first. On a recommendation from the receptionist, they head downtown to see USS Niagara.

Sam looks at him expectantly. “So is this what you wanted?” he asks.

Bucky looks around, not sure what to think. “Kind of?” he admits. “I mean, yes, we should take Steve to stuff, but this is not the right place. I’m not going to leave him at just any random place. It needs to be nice. I’m not saying that the ship isn’t but… you know.” He shrugs.

Sam lets out a long-suffering sigh. “Okay, I think we need to be more proactive about this,” he decides. “I get your idea about just going with the flow and taking Steve wherever the road might lead us, but we need to have some sort of plan and some sort of destination.”

“Well, the destination is… Spokane?” Bucky offers.

“But how are we going to get there? Are we just going to drive straight west? Are there any places we should definitely cover? For example, do we want to go to the Grand Canyon or not?”

“Probably not? It’s too far out of the way?”

“Okay, we should go back to the hotel room and make a plan. And also download some podcasts because I’m not spending another day in silence with you, Barnes, and your taste in music is terrible.”

In the end, despite Sam’s protests and his heavy eyerolls, Bucky looks up the closest book store on his phone and buys a road atlas, 1,000 Places to See Before You Die, and a guide each for the US National Parks and the US Scenic Highways and Byways.

~*~

They follow the Lake Erie Coastal trail for the next day into Cleveland, stopping by the Erie Land Lighthouse and Presque Isle State Park. Much to Sam’s relief, Bucky is quiet most of the time, staring out of the window and listening to Stuff You Should Know via the car’s speakers. Sam is starting to think that maybe this is a mistake and maybe Bucky isn’t doing this just for Steve, but also for himself. Sam understands this – to an extent – but also asks himself if he needs to be part of Bucky’s grand plans. Everybody grieves differently after all. But then Sam isn’t quite sure he knows how to grieve. The last time he lost some one, he didn’t… Sam forces himself to think of something else.

They wander the streets of Cleveland and end up at the statue of Jesse Owens. Bucky stares at the plaque for a long moment.

“It’s been so long,” he says quietly. “I remember it like it was yesterday.”

“It was still a feat for the ages,” Sam tells him. “My high school was named after Jesse Owens and they taught us that it took almost 50 years for another person to also win four gold medals at the Olympics.”

“Oh wow,” Bucky looks up at the statue, “I didn’t know that. But I remember going to the movies with Steve and seeing him during the news reel. He was so fast, we couldn’t believe it. And then all the newspaper articles about his miraculous wins – single-handedly crushing Hitler's myth of Aryan supremacy basically.”

“Which is a little ironic,” Sam points out, “you know, considering.”

“What do you mean?” Bucky asks, honestly curious.

“In Germany Jesse Owens could stay in the same hotels as his white teammates – it was impossible in most states in the US. At an event honoring him at the Waldorf Astoria, he wasn’t allowed to enter through the front entrance and had to take the freight elevator instead. He never got invited to the White House – Olympians usually are – but reportedly Hitler congratulated him personally.”

“Oh… yeah… we didn’t really have the moral high ground in that regard, did we?”

“Nope.”

Thanks to Sam’s googleing, they decide to forego the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and to head to the International Women Air & Space Museum instead.

~*~

“This is amazing.” Bucky stares out of the train windows in wonder, taking in the scenery in front of him. Sam silently agrees that the views are stunning, even more so because they’re sitting in the first-class dome car of the Cuyahoga Valley Scenic Railroad, which allows them a 360° view of the surrounding area.

It had been Bucky’s idea to check out the places administered by the National Parks Service and Sam would rather die than to admit it, but it has been a great idea. The only national park Sam had seen before Cuyahoga Valley had been the Grand Canyon for a few hours with a couple of fellow soldiers from the pararescue program when they were on leave from a base in the Las Vegas area. And while it had certainly been spectacular, Sam most vividly remembers the crowds of people, almost exclusively white. There had been international travelers, but Sam had been the only black person around.

Four days into their journey, they’re now halfway on the train ride taking them from Independence to Akron. They’ll take the train later this afternoon to get back to their car. Sam still isn’t quite sure what to make of Bucky’s plan. While they’ve come across a few great sights, so far he’s made no mention of scattering some of Steve’s remains anywhere. They’re certainly taking him everywhere, safely ensconced in a backpack that Bucky carries most of the time, but so far all they’ve done is exploring and looking at stuff.

~*~

“This is disappointing,” Sam says, looking at the replica of Apollo 11 Lunar Module standing in between a McDonald’s to their right, a bank to their left and a K-Mart in the background.

“It’s only a half-scale replica,” Bucky, who’s studying the plaques put up at different spots of the site commemorating Neil Armstrong’s very first flight at age 6, explains. “It took them almost 3,000 hours to build it.”

“Still,” Sam persists, “we drove two hours out of the way for this. And by ‘we’ I mean I drove.”

“I could’ve done it – but you won’t let me drive,” Bucky points out, surprisingly calm.

“Not going to happen. I’ve seen Steve drive and he’s the worst. And you have all the same stuff going on and you’ve been brainwashed several times.”

Sam regrets his words because they spend most of the next few days driving, heading south for a few hours to take Highway 40, the Historic National Road, into Indiana. They drive back north from Indianapolis into Amish Country and spend entirely too much time at the Heritage Ridge Creamery watching cheese being made. Must to Sam’s annoyance Bucky requests him to stop at almost every single place where horses – and in extension buggies – are tied to hitching posts in front of stores.

They drive further north along the shore of Lake Michigan, on roads framed by oaks, maples, cedars, birches and cherry trees. They catch the sunset over Lake Michigan from an overlook along Pierce Stocking Scenic Drive. It’s quiet and peaceful and much to his surprise, Sam finds himself suggesting scattering a bit of Steve here, but Bucky rejects that idea.

“Not yet,” he says mysteriously.

The next day over the bridge to the Upper Michigan Peninsula. On the advice of one of Bucky’s guidebooks, they make a detour to see Monocle Lake, Spectacle Lake and the Point Iroquois Lighthouse.

They stop at the Whitefish Point Lighthouse and before Sam has even had the chance to put the car into park, Bucky is out of the door, backpack in hand, and walking briskly towards the shoreline. Sam hurries behind him.

“Here,” Bucky simply announces, standing at the water’s edge, and gets the urn out of the backpack.

“What?” Sam asks. “Why?”

“It’s peaceful here.”

“This is close to a shipwreck museum,” Sam points out.

“It’s peaceful here,” Bucky repeats, “a good place to rest.”

Sam asks himself if he should protest or ask for further reasons why this is the place, but he looks around and finds that Bucky is right. It _is_ peaceful here and Steve would’ve liked it. He can almost imagine him walking around, sketchbook in hand. That thought almost physically hurts so Sam distracts himself by observing Bucky, who opens the lid, grabs a handful of ashes and scatters them in the wind.

Sam can almost feel the pressure easing from Bucky’s shoulders. He just stands there, quiet, breathing deeply, eyes closed, his hair gently ruffled by the wind. Sam loses track of time and doesn’t check how long they’re standing there.

~*~

The next few days pass in relative ease. Much to his horror, Sam finds out that Bucky has not read any of the Harry Potter books, and they listen to the audiobooks while they drive further along the shore of Lake Superior, discover the local specialty, crunchy cinnamon-sugar toast, in the town of Trenary, and see the mysterious Paulding Light before they head south towards Wisconsin and then Chicago.

It all comes to a head two days later. Later Sam will blame it on the truly terrible motel they’re staying at because it’s the only place with a vacancy within an 80-mile radius. That and the cop who pulled him over for another episode of driving while black, resulting in a ticket for running a stop sign that Sam, who used a fake ID and a car that’s registered to what he assumes is one of Natasha’s shell companies, has no intention of ever paying.

Sam wishes he were no longer be unnerved by this. In his 35 years of life, he has been subject to plenty traffic stops, stop and frisk and the like. He knows how to behave, how to minimize the chance that he’ll get shot, but the randomness and powerlessness still gets to him. In this case, the cop had been aggressive, with his right hand resting on his service weapon almost the entire time and Sam had just known that even if he did everything right, he might still end up with a bullet in the chest.

Bucky on the passenger seat, whose goddamn idea the whole road trip had been, hadn’t seemed to notice anything.

It starts with a nonsense argument about where to head next. The obvious next destination is Chicago, it’s just a question of how much of Wisconsin they want to explore and whether they’ll head back north after Chicago, more in the direction of Spokane, or further south, towards Kentucky and/or Missouri. Sam honestly doesn’t care – this is still more Bucky’s idea than his – but he argues against going south because it’ll take them further away from their ultimate destination.

It escalates when Bucky, sitting on the bed surrounded by the guidebooks Sam has started to loathe, says, “I’ve known Steve the longest so I think I should decide.”

Sam stares at him in disbelief and within a split second decides to retaliate. “I’ve known Steve better in his final years. I spent the last years in the trenches with him while you decided to focus on your mental health.”

Bucky’s eyes narrow to slits. “Trenches? You don’t even know what that means. I spent time with him in the real trenches, in Europe, during the deadliest conflict in human history.”

“And then you were brainwashed and 70 years passed and Steve adjusted to a new life.”

“Fuck you,” Bucky spits out. “You had like what, five years with Steve? I spent almost my entire life with him. I was there when he was small and sickly. You don’t know how it is, to fear for his life-”

“Well, at least you were prepared because he died anyway.” As soon as they words leave his mouth, Sam knows that he’s gone too far but it’s too late to take them back.

Bucky jumps from the bed and stands right in front of Sam, staring at him angrily. “How dare you,” he hisses. “How. Dare. You.”

For a moment they just stand in this strange stand-off. “I’m taking him,” Sam finally announces.

“No, you’re not.”

Sam walks towards the bedside table and picks up the urn. “Fuck you, Barnes. This is ridiculous. We’re going back to DC and find a place for him. That’s the best thing to do. This whole road trip idea is more for your benefit than for Steve’s.”

“It’s not,” Bucky protests.

“Look,” Sam tries in a conciliatory tone as he’s heading towards the door. “I know that we’re all grieving, but this is misguided.”

Instead of an answer, Bucky comes up behind him and tries to grasp the urn from Sam’s hands. They shuffle for a few seconds, but Bucky definitely has strength on his side. Sam lets go of the urn, but at the same time Bucky takes a step back, his grasp on it tenuous.

Sam can see the urn fall in slow motion. It hits the floor with a deafening sound and breaks apart, spilling Steve’s ashes onto the carpet.

Sam and Bucky stare at each other in shock before they both drop to their knees, trying to gather up Steve’s remains. Sam grabs a plastic shopping bag that’s lying on the bed and helps Bucky putting the ashes into it. When they’ve managed to gather most of it, Sam gets up from the floor but Bucky sits back and leans against the bed.

Bucky drags both hands across his face. “Fuck,” he says. For a moment he looks like he’s close to tears. “Fuck.”

Sam has no idea what to say, so he just stands awkwardly in the middle of the room, plastic bag still in hand.

Bucky looks up at him. “Part of Steve is going to end up in the maid’s vacuum,” he says, sounding strangely hollow.

“You honestly believe they clean this place?” Sam simply says the first thing that comes to his mind. “He’s going to stay here, in the carpet of the grossest motel in history.”

For a second Bucky stares at him before he starts laughing hysterically, sounding like he’s laughing because crying is the worse option.

Sam approaches him. “Get up,” he tells him, grabbing Bucky by the shoulders. “I don’t want to stay here. We _shouldn’t_ stay here. I don’t care if we have to sleep in the car, let’s just go.”

Bucky nods, grabs his stuff and follows him mutely out of the room. They pack everything into the car and Sam drives east until they hit the shore of Lake Michigan again. He finds a place to park the car and they just sit in the darkness, their breathing the only sound in the car, slowly fogging up the windows.

“I didn’t mean it, you know,” Sam finally says into the silence.

“I know,” Bucky answers, equally quiet. “The thing is… you’re kind of right?”

“What do you mean?”

“Almost all the time I’ve known Steve, I was prepared for him to die. He had so many-” Bucky stops himself with a shuddering breath. Sam asks himself if he should turn on the lights inside the car so he can see Bucky’s expressions, can see what he’s feeling, but then he’s afraid that turning on the lights will ruin this moment. There’s safety in simply saying things into the darkness.

“He got sick so many times… a few times I even thought he wouldn’t make it. And then there was the serum and that’s now making it worse? I was afraid for Steve’s life for the longest time and then he suddenly became healthy and basically invincible and I was sure that he’d live a long, happy life, outliving me for sure. I no longer had to worry.”

Bucky stops.

“And then he died anyway,” Sam finishes the story for him.

“And he wasn’t even happy!” Bucky is sounding angry now. “There was always one war or another. One sacrifice after another. One more thing Steve was stupidly devoted to. One more responsibility he felt he needed to carry. And then he was alone for a year trying to bring us back.”

Sam has no idea what to say about any of this. He’s tried helping so many veterans during his work at the VA but now feels helpless and out of his depth.

“And I thought he was safe, that I could stop worrying… I let my guard down and that’s why it hurts even worse now. And at the same time I feel so selfish because this shouldn’t be about me, I mean, he died but I’m still alive, right? But I can’t help but think that this is the universe punishing me.”

“No,” Sam disagrees immediately, “it’s not your fault.”

“That’s easy for you to say,” Bucky says quietly, “and words are cheap.”

“Which is why you want to do this for Steve,” Sam realizes, “this trip.”

“Well… partially. Steve never had any of this. And he is Captain America, but does he really know America? And New York might have been the place that made him, but I want him to rest in peaceful places and places he would’ve liked.”

“Okay,” Sam says.

“And I’m sorry I roped you into this.”

“Don’t-” Sam begins.

“If you want, I can do this on my own. You just have to leave me his remains. Please. But I figured, maybe you also weren’t quite ready to fully say goodbye yet.”

Sam thinks about it for a long moment. Unbidden and unwanted thoughts of Riley come to his mind again. He’s buried at Arlington and before Sam had been disavowed by his own country, he’d made an annual pilgrimage to his grave. He wonders if things were different if he’d grieved differently. He didn’t really have time for grief back then. He’d been deployed in one of the most active combat zones of the Afghan war. The entire western border with Pakistan had been – and still was – a powder keg, rife with Taliban insurgents. Three days after his best friend’s death, Sam had been forced to fly his next combat mission. But his heart had no longer been in it. He’d requested a transfer soon after and left the air force altogether a little more than a year after the RPG had knocked his partner out of the sky right next to him. Maybe his life had played out differently if he’d had the chance to do something like this after Riley’s death, hadn’t been forced to shove the guilt and the grief aside to function. In the end, he’d managed to channel it into something productive, but that might have been just plain luck.

Sam considers Bucky’s offer and thinks about the alternatives. When he’d set out to save Steve from the whole dog and pony show the US government had put up for him, he hadn’t planned further than that. He has no idea what he wants to do next. He doesn’t want to go back to flying, not yet at least. He could find a purpose, a distraction but in a way, Bucky is right: reality hasn’t set in yet; he hasn’t said goodbye to Steve yet.

“I’m not,” he confesses out loud. “Let’s drive on.”


	2. Part II

### Part II

They compromise and travel to Chicago, back to civilization as Sam puts it, first and will explore Illinois for a bit. They’ll head back north, drive alongside the Mississippi afterwards, go see Mount Rushmore and Theodore Roosevelt National Park and whatever else catches their interest.

Bucky buys his first camera in Chicago and spends the next three nights at their hotel room watching one YouTube video after another, trying to learn as much about photography as possible. Sam teases him but isn’t mean about it, probably because he knows that Steve has always been the artsy one and that Bucky is simply trying something new.

The first thing Bucky photographs is the gigantic Tiffany Dome at the Chicago Cultural Center. His second photograph is of the secret agent supply store in Wicker Park, which he sends to Natasha, before he heads inside to buy the Secret Service Agent earbuds for Sam.

After Chicago they detour south to Lincoln’s home and take a take a self-guided stroll through the neighborhood before heading west towards St. Louis to start following Mississippi back north.

“The Mississippi is a good idea for Steve, right?” Bucky asks as they cross the river to head into St. Louis. “It’s the great American river, shouldn’t Steve be part of it?”

Sam considers it for a few seconds. “I guess so.” He nods towards the guidebook in Bucky’s lap. “You’re only asking this because you already have a spot in mind, don’t you?”

“There is the Chain of Rocks Bridge,” Bucky explains, “used to be part of Route 66. Now it’s only accessible for pedestrians and bicyclists.”

“Sounds good to me,” is all Sam says.

They get up early the next morning to avoid the crowds, head towards the bridge and walk to the middle of it. Sam holds out the bag for Bucky to take a handful of Steve’s ashes. They never bought a new urn for him, so they’re now carrying him around in a Ziploc bag. They both don’t think that Steve would mind. It’s just for transport anyway.

“I’ve been meaning to ask,” Sam says, “should we eulogize him? It just feels so weird to simply throw him in the wind.”

“Do you have anything to say?” Bucky asks. He cannot come up with anything.

Sam shakes his head. “I’m coming up empty. Other than, you know, thanks for saving the world countless times?”

“Yeah,” Bucky agrees quietly. He turns towards railing facing south and thinks about it for a moment longer. He still has nothing he would want to say and thinks that the gesture is probably enough so he raises his hand and throws the ashes into the air. They dance in the wind for a second and then a huge gust of wind comes from the south and blows them right back into Bucky’s face.

Sam stares at him in absolute horror for a moment, all wide-eyed and open-mouthed, like he can’t believe that that just happened. Then he doubles over in laughter. Sam laughs so hard that he has to hold his sides and is gasping for air while Bucky just stands there, the ashes of his dead best friend in his hair, his eyelids, and between his teeth. He just stalks off in direction of the car, trying to wipe is face clean as he goes.

Sam hurries after him. “Sorry man,” he says although he’s still grinning.

“Sure,” Bucky answers, disgruntled.

“I mean,” Sam begins, “that’s a very Steve thing he just did.”

“What?” Bucky stops to stare at him.

“He’s a class A troll,” Sam explains and Bucky silently agrees, “and this is probably his way of showing that he hates the long hair too.”

“Well, I don’t find it funny and you know what, I’ll drain him down the sink just for that.”

“Don’t be petty, Barnes.”

Bucky just shots him an exasperated look and continues to the car. As he’s standing under the hot shower ten minutes later and watches Steve’s ashes swirl down the drain, he thinks of something he could’ve said: You are an asshole sometimes but you are never mean. You are a good person. You are a punk with a fucking attitude but you only go up against the people who deserve it. You believe in people and made me believe in them too.

~*~

Wisconsin is a mixture of the strange (World's Largest Six-Pack), the weird (Jurustic Park) and the nightmarish (FAST Fiberglass Mold Graveyard). Bucky hears about Paul Bunyan for the first time at the Paul Bunyan Logging Camp Museum (“Wasn’t he already a thing in the 1940s?” Sam asks, honestly curious. – “I had better things to do than to find out about a gigantic lumberjack and his companion, a blue ox called Babe,” Bucky replies deadpan) and finds the strangest thing of all.

Bucky eyes the ball of twine suspiciously before poking it with his index finger. They’ve stopped to see the World’s Heaviest Ball of Twine at Lake Nebagamon, and its creator James Frank Kotera, nicknamed “JFK.” JFK is telling Sam his life story while Bucky walks around the gigantic ball, trying to figure out if it means anything. Maybe JFK just needs another hobby?

He then leads them to a second ball of twine, which JFK affectionately calls “Junior”, which weights 47 pounds. Sam is still feigning interest but Bucky can tell how difficult it is for him to maintain a neutral facial expression.

They’re back in the car when Sam finally cracks. “That was so weird,” he says.

“The weirdest,” Bucky echoes.

“I mean, people do the weirdest thing for their tiny claim to fame, right?” Sam says, sounding suspiciously chipper.

“But the World’s Heaviest Ball of Twine?”

Sam shrugs nonchalantly. “I mean, in terms of weight, JFK really can claim that he has the world’s biggest balls.”

Bucky groans as Sam grins widely. “You’ve been waiting to say that, haven’t you? What are you, twelve?”

“It might seem that way to you because you’re 238 years old.”

~*~

As they cross into Minnesota, they first thing on their itinerary is the Frank Lloyd Wright Gas Station.

“This is kind of cool,” Bucky judges, “that’s what people thought the future would look like in 1958.”

“It’s at the same time outdated and modern,” Sam observes.

“I mean, the future is always disappointing. We were promised flying cars back in 1943.”

“You were?”

“Yeah, by Howard Stark.” Bucky says the name without thinking, remembering first how he took Steve to the World Expo on their last day together in New York, before realizing that he might’ve kept Howard Stark from fulfilling his plans because he killed him almost 30 years ago. He swallows hard tries to distract himself by looking for the entrance towards the observation deck.

“Do you… do you want to talk about him?” Sam asks hesitantly, following him up the stairs.

“No,” Bucky says firmly, ending the discussion.

They head north afterwards, to the northernmost part of the continuous 48 states. They have to detour through Canada to make it to the Angle and use the videophone at the border crossing back into Minnesota to report to Canadian U.S. Custom. While they’re there, Bucky looks up the southernmost, easternmost and westernmost places of the lower 48 even though they probably won’t get to see them. At the rate they’re currently going, they should make it to Spokane in a few more weeks.

On their way to Minneapolis, they drive through Erskine and even though they need gas, by an unspoken agreement they don’t stop. They encounter both another statue of Paul Bunyan (“What’s up with that?” Bucky asks, confused now) and the statue of a gigantic Viking.

“Is that supposed to be Thor?” Bucky asks, trying to combine the appearance of the Thor he knows with the kitschy statue in front of him.

“That’s what it says,” Sam replies unhelpfully. “Supposedly he came to this place area in the 1300s. And isn’t Thor like 2,000 years old?”

“That makes no sense. If he did, this thing would carry a hammer, not a spear.”

“True.”

“Why are people doing this?” Bucky asks. “Do you think Thor actually came here?”

In the next few days, they will see a gigantic blue cock, a gigantic spoon and cherry, a gigantic jolly green giant statue, a gigantic pipe in a place called Pipestone, a giant prairie dog and a giant fiberglass dinosaur, and Bucky will tell himself to stop asking for a reason.

~*~

They’re in Minneapolis, getting ready to head to the Mill City Museum, when Sam’s phone with the emergency number he gave to his family rings. It’s the first ever call on this number and his stomach plummets while his brain goes through all the possibilities why his younger sister according to caller ID would call him out of the blue. He really should have stopped by to check on them when he was in DC.

He answers the phone with trembling hands.

“You’re no longer on the FBI’s most wanted list,” his sister Kayla announces instead of a greeting and Sam lets out a sigh of relief, sinking down on the bed and rubbing his eyes for a second. Bucky looks at him strangely but doesn’t say anything.

“Hi Kay,” he says, “I’m doing well, thank you for asking.”

“Funny,” she comments dryly, “but I figured I’d cut right to the chase seeing you probably had a heart attack when you saw me calling this number.”

“True,” he admits.

“So yeah, this is good news. And since you’re now no longer a criminal, we can now contact you whenever we want.”

It feels so good to hear her voice. These past few years, communication with his family has been brief and mostly perfunctory and he has talked to his youngest sister the least. His parents have been his main point of contact and he’d made sure to talk to his older sister now and then, mostly to ask for photos and videos of his nieces, who’d grown up so fast while he was on the run. He’s always been close to his younger sister, a lawyer working for a lobbying firm on K Street now, talking about everything and nothing, but this communication had suffered a lot when calling back home had always meant endangering his family and thus he’d mostly called for status updates, not to chat.

“I think Minty will livestream Brianna’s first day at school for you if you don’t make it back for that. And no excuse to not be home for Christmas,” she continues. “Also, I’ll invite you to my 30th birthday party, but don’t feel obliged to come.”

“Thanks. You could live stream that one too,” he teases.

Bucky taps him on the shoulder and mimes that he’ll wait for him outside. “Take your time,” he whispers.

“No way I’m putting that on the internet,” she shoots back. “So what exciting locale are you at right now? Is it Wakanda? Please tell me it’s Wakanda. I need you to invite me for a visit like yesterday, it’s-”

“Not Wakanda,” he interrupts her, “Minneapolis actually.”

She’s silent for a second. “What? You’re back stateside?” she sounds accusatory and Sam grimaces at the tone, knowing she has every right to be angry. He’s been putting off contacting his family for no good reason at all, except that he wasn’t ready. He didn’t want to bring up memories about the last time he got home to the US having lost a friend in combat.

“Sorry,” he says, knowing how lame it sounds.

“Dude,” she says. “Dude, I’m telling mama.”

“No, don’t-” he starts.

“She’s been worried,” his sister cuts him off, “not knowing where you were! We’ve all seen the news. I mean, mama told me that you were alright, not injured or anything, but we all know that that’s only half of the story anyway. We’ve been wondering, you know, how you were doing, dealing with Captain Ameri-”

“Don’t,” he interrupts her, not wanting her to say it, “please don’t.”

The silence stretches for a long moment, uncomfortable. “Yeah, that’s what I thought,” Kay says quietly, but Sam doesn’t answer, not sure how he wants that conversation to go. He doesn’t want to dwell on Steve’s fate.

“Why Minneapolis?” she asks instead, much to his relief.

“There’s this thing…” he begins, not really sure how to explain what they’re doing and not wanting to tell her that they stole Steve’s ashes, “that Bucky and I are doing for… for Steve.”

“Bucky?” she repeats, “aka Bucky Barnes aka the Winter Soldier aka the thorn in your side aka the guy you hate?”

“That’ll be him.”

“What the-” Kay stops herself, probably because she too doesn’t know what to say. “So you’re doing this for Steve?” she asks in a way that Sam knows doesn’t require an answer. “And you’re taking good care of yourself?”

“Yeah,” he confirms, not sure if the latter is actually really true.

“And you and Bucky are not at each other’s throats?”

“Actually, we might be becoming friends,” Sam admits.

“Is this some weird romcom enemies to friends to lovers thing?”

Sam laughs softly at that. “Nope. But if it were, you’d be the first to know.”

“I’d better be!”

“So, we’re cool?” he asks.

“Yeah, of course,” she answers, “but we’re all worried about you. Don’t be a stranger. Two years of this were enough.”

“I know, I’m sorry. I’ll give mama a call and will be better about this.”

~*~

They find out about Art Alley in Rapid City by accident as they stroll downtown taking a break from driving on their way to Mount Rushmore and the Crazy Horse Memorial. They almost walk past it on their search for food when Sam looks to his left and sees the entire street, walls, telephone pools, pipes, dumpsters, every single available surface but the pavement, covered in art. He grabs Bucky by the arm to stop him and nods towards the alley.

The alley is only a few hundred feet long, but they take their time exploring all the artwork. The colors and variety of styles leave Sam breathless. He sees Bucky taking some pictures but Sam simply tries to take it all in. Photos could never do this justice anyway.

Bucky waits for him once they’ve made their way through the alley. “Did Steve ever experiment with spray paint?” he asks.

“Not that I know but I only very rarely saw him work on his artwork. He keeps it very private.”

“He started that when he became Captain America,” Bucky says.

“There was stuff in his office at the Compound, but that’s probably the only time I’ve seen it on display. From what I’ve seen, he mostly stuck to sketching, mediums that are familiar to him. But I kept joking that he should buy some spray can to graffiti ‘Fuck you, Ross’ to a wall whenever we had been faster in getting help to people than General Ross and his lackeys.”

“He didn’t do that?” Bucky asks, amused.

“I bet he was tempted but he always said that people had bigger things to worry about already and that he didn’t want to add vandalism to their list of problems.”

“He’s too noble for his own good sometimes.” Bucky shakes his head, smiling affectionately.

“I think he would like it here,” Sam says quietly.

Bucky looks at him. “Do you mean-”

“Yeah.”

Bucky opens his backpack, takes out the plastic bag and holds it open for Sam. “You do the honors.”

Sam grabs a handful of ashes. It’s coarser than he expected. He’d thought that it would basically be very fine sand but there are large and small pieces. He throws it into the air and watches it slowly dissolve.

“Because you’re an artist first,” he says quietly, swallowing hard, before he turns around the corner.

~*~

The fact that Steve’s birthday is coming up hits Bucky out of nowhere. They’ve long lost track of time and only realize that 4th of July is approaching as they are driving through Fargo, ND, and see a banner inviting the town to the annual fireworks and Independence Day Festivities.

It feels like a punch to the gut, both because they will have to celebrate without Steve and because Bucky realizes that Steve had already celebrated his 100th birthday, miserable, trying to figure out how to save the universe after having lost so many of his friends. Now he’s no longer there for the do-over.

Sam brings the topic up that night. “We’re not doing anything, right?” he says. “For… you know,” he clears his throat awkwardly, “Independence Day.”

“Can we do that?” Bucky asks back, remembering Independence Day festivities with such clarity even though he hasn’t taken part in any for 70 years. “It’s the most important national holiday. Can we simply pretend it doesn’t- that it doesn’t mean anything?”

“It’s just another day,” Sam insists even though it hardly sounds convincing.

They decide to head into Canada and spend two days in Manitoba, just north of the border. At first they try to pretend that it means nothing, that this is just part of their road trip and that they should just drive and explore like they do in the US, but the pretense gets exhausting after the first day.

The second day, Steve’s birthday, they simply spend on the porch of the little cabin they found while looking for a last-minute accommodation, waiting, doing nothing, but even that becomes too much to bear for Bucky.

“I used to tell him that the fireworks were just for him, when we were young,” he says into the tense silence.

“You did?”

“Yeah. I mean, obviously he didn’t believe me. Not after he’d turned 10 at least, but it was great to pretend that it was special, just for him. We didn’t have much else at times.”

Sam only nods and they fall back into silence, but this time it feels less depressing.

“It’s too much of a spectacle for him now,” Sam speaks up a few minutes later. “He hates the spectacle, the whole myth, you know, surrounding everything of his life. Because it’s so perfect, Captain America’s birthday on America’s birthday, when in reality it was just Steve, trying to make sense of the lost time.”

“So he didn’t celebrate in the past?”

“He took great pains to be busy in early July.”

“I escaped once,” Bucky confesses after Sam has fallen silent again, “on Independence Day.”

Sam stares at him in shock. “Dude, what?”

“Must have been in the 60s I think? They deployed me for a hit job in New York and something must have screwed up my programming. Like… I knew that the day was important, you know.” Bucky shrugs. He rarely talks about his time as the Winter Soldier and finds that keeping a certain level of detachment helps. It wasn’t really him after all. “But not for America but for me?”

“Fuck,” Sam mutters.

“I went AWOL for three days. When they finally found me… despite all of Shuri’s help, these memories are kind of garbled because they severely adjusted my programming but I… I _know_ that my punishment was severe.”

“Fuck,” Sam repeats, dragging a hand across his face. “I don’t know what to say to that.”

“Would you rather that I hadn’t told you?” Bucky asks, uncertainty creeping into his voice.

“No,” Sam immediately objects and to his credit, he sounds convincing, “no, just… Steve was so important to you that you broke your programming on his birthday, even though you’d been stripped of your entire personality. How do you go on now that he’s no longer here?”

Bucky still doesn’t have an answer to that so he just shrugs, knowing that at some point that’s not going to be enough.

~*~

“That’s the stuff my nightmares are made of,” Sam says, looking up at the gigantic turtle in front of him. “I thought I’d seen it all when I saw a turtle made out of tire rims an hour ago, but this…”

“I told myself I wouldn’t ask why any longer, not after that big green guy in Wisconsin, but… why? Why is there a 30-feet tall turtle on a snow mobile in nowhere North Dakota?”

“It’s the fucking snow mobile that gets me,” Sam continues, disregarding Bucky’s question. “Why would a turtle need a snow mobile?”

“Don’t you find his lack of expression more worrisome?” Bucky asks. “His eyes are quotation marks and his mouth is like a black vortex slashing is head into two.”

“Thanks for that description,” Sam says flatly, “it’s going to haunt me forever now.”

“Maybe this place is haunted,” Bucky muses, “and that’s why he’s here. Maybe there’s a ghost trapped inside.”

“Dude,” Sam sounds actually annoyed, “Thank you for making this gigantic, expressionless turtle on a fucking snow mobile even more horrifying.”

~*~

“Is that a butt?” Bucky says, squinting in the distance. They’re driving on the interstate towards Theodore Roosevelt National Park.

“What?”

“That’s a butt facing us, of a gigantic cow?”

“It’s a buffalo,” Sam supplies helpfully as they get closer and he can see as well.

“We have to check that out.”

“Has our experience with Tommy Turtle taught you nothing? We’re not stopping for any more gigantic animals.”

~*~

Bucky reads the poem for Salem Sue, the world’s largest Holstein cow.

_We’ve got the world’s largest Holstein cow, that looks across our fields._

_Her presence shows that New Salem grows with milk-producers’ yields, with milk-producers’ yields, with milk-producers’ yields._

“Why are they calling out that it’s a Holstein cow?” he asks. “Are there any other types of cow?”

Sam, who stands next to him, probably annoyed at himself that he’d let Bucky convince him to stop for another gigantic animal, rolls his eyes. “Do I look like I know cow breeds, Barnes?”

“But it begs the question: Are there any other gigantic cows in the US?”

“Even if there are, you are never going to see them because I will drive past them no matter how much you beg.”

~*~

As they cross into Montana, they spent almost an entire day only driving while the Rockies slowly creep closer. They’re stopped by the police once and Sam gets another ticket, this time for going 5 miles over the speed limit. Like the ticket a few weeks earlier he just throws it into the glove box, thus letting Bucky know that he has no intention of ever paying it.

They see the Berkeley Pit, marveling at the sheer toxicity of the place before driving north to Roe River, the shortest river in America. They stop in Cut Bank to take a picture with the penguin declaring it to be the coldest city in the US.

They make it into Glacier National Park the next day and the vistas are overwhelming. Taking the Going the Sun Road to their lodgings inside the park around noon means that it’s slow going as the park is nearly at capacity with all the visitors during the summer. Bucky and Sam make the trek again early the next day, taking the shuttle bus this time, and stopping at every single stop so that Bucky can take pictures and at the visitor’s center for a few hours to learn about the effects of climate change in the park.

They hike the Grinnell Glacier Trail and scatter some of Steve’s ashes at the top of the trail before making their descent. As they catch the sunset over Lake McDonald, huckleberry ice cream in hand, Bucky thinks that this might just have been his favorite part of their journey so far.

~*~

They are driving on Highway 4 west of the Burke Ghost Town in heavy rain, when there is a sudden slapping sound from the back of their car before it veers sharply to the left.

“Shit,” Sam swears, gripping the steering wheel tightly as he managed to navigate the car onto the shoulder. He looks into the side mirror. “The back tire on my side is gone,” he announces.

“Wonderful,” Bucky says sarcastically.

Neither of them moves for a moment. Bucky simply stares at Sam, willing him to volunteer.

“I’m not going out there in the rain,” Sam crosses his arms in front of his chest, glaring back at Bucky.

“Neither am I.”

“Rock paper scissors?” Sam suggests.

They play best out of three and two minutes later Sam is cursing loudly as he rummages through the trunk for his rain jacket. Bucky watches Sam struggle from the safety of the car passengers’ seat, but after 10 minutes Sam opens the driver’s door.

“I don’t mean to be an asshole about this,” he says, “I am many things, but not a sore loser, but I need your help.”

For a moment Bucky is tempted to be petty about it, but he wants to drive on as much as Sam, so he just says okay, and joins him outside in the pouring rain. Sam is working on raising the vehicle with the jack. “I’ll need you help unscrewing the lug nuts,” he tells Bucky, “I haven’t had any luck loosening those. Your metal arm will probably do the trick.”

Bucky is about to say something, when the car suddenly jolts forward, rolling on its own for a few inches. The jack falls onto Sam’s foot, who yelps in pain.

“I’ll check the parking brake-” Bucky begins but is interrupted by Sam letting out a scream of frustration.

“Goddammit,” Sam yells and starts kicking the flat tire and keeps kicking it. “God fucking dammit.” He finally falls to his knees and covers his eyes with his hand. “I couldn’t save him.”

“What?” Bucky is too stunned to say anything else.

“I couldn’t save him. I failed. I couldn’t save him,” Sam repeats.

“Sam-”

“He’s dead and there was nothing I could do.” Sam starts crying in earnest then, his shoulders heaving. “Nothing.”

For a moment Bucky just stands there awkwardly, in the pouring rain, with Sam, whose grief must have finally overwhelmed him, crying his first real tears since Steve’s death. He lets Sam exhaust himself because he thinks that whatever he’ll say is just going to ring hollow anyway before he maneuvers an almost catatonic Sam onto the passenger seat while he makes quick work of the flat tire and has the spare tire installed within a few minutes. The drive to the next town is mercifully short. He finds them some accommodation and shoves a silent Sam first into their room and then towards the shower.

“Take a hot shower, that’ll make you feel better,” he tries to cajole him.

Sam just huffs in disbelief. “I doubt it,” he mumbles darkly.

“Well, at least you’ll no longer be wet and freezing, so that’s something.”

~*~

Bucky knows that they should talk about this, but he doesn’t really know how to get Sam talking again so he opts to get him drunk first. He asks the receptionist where to find the next bar, steers Sam into the direction of an available booth, and orders them both a beer and an obscene amount of fries.

Sam drains his first glass in silence and doesn’t touch any of the food.

Bucky is about to rethink his plan when Sam finally speaks up. “Do you sometimes question why we’re doing what we’re doing?”

“It’s for Steve,” Bucky says without thinking.

“No.” Sam makes an all-encompassing gesture with his hand. “I mean all of it. Why did you join the fight?”

“It was the war. I got drafted and then…” Bucky swallows hard. “Steve. I’m following him. I’m always trying to protect him.”

Sam sighs loudly.

“Without Steve… I don’t really know what to do,” Bucky volunteers.

Sam hums in acknowledgement. “I’m selfish, you know,” he says.

Bucky looks up at him sharply. “No you’re not.”

“Yes, I am… I wanted to be a hero.” Sam traces the rim of his glass with his index finger. “That’s why I signed up. I was just selfish, I wanted to be a hero.”

“Sam, no, Steve asked you to. You did him and us all a favor.”

“No, I meant before all of this, before superheroes, when I volunteered for the military. I thought I’d become a hero. Change the outcome of the war – at least a little.” Sam smiles sadly. “That’s why I signed up for pararescue. Best of the best. I wanted to be one of the few that survived one of the hardest military trainings in the world.” Sam drains his beer and signals the waitress for another one. “When I was first deployed, long before the Falcon… I was a doing combat rescue, trying to rescue the men of my unit while we were deployed in the Kandahar Province. Everybody… all of them died. I never arrived in time to save them from their wounds.”

“That’s not your fault,” Bucky says reflexively. He cringes and tries to make it sound as genuine as he feels. “Sam, you did your best. Everything else-”

“I know, but then… I really wanted to save somebody, you know. To not have them bleed out under my fingers before I could even get them away from the battlefield. _To be a hero._ And then this guy from my unit, Sullivan… he had a headshot,” Bucky sucks in a sharp breath, “through and through.” Sam points his left index finger first to his left temple and then a spot just above his forehead on the right side. “Entry and exit wound. I did what I was trained to do and I saved him. Stabilized him, got him from the battle field and had him medevaced. When we got back to the base and when the news started to make rounds everybody said I was a hero.”

“You were, that’s impressive, Sam.”

Sam simply shakes his head. “I had people come up to me and clap me on the shoulder and tell me how great I was. This should’ve been everything I wanted, I was hailed a hero, but I felt like the absolute worst.”

“Why?”

“I couldn’t tell them…” Sam takes a deep breath, “and I never told anybody this really, that I didn’t consider myself a hero. I told myself that I’d only saved him for selfish reasons, because I wanted to feel good about _myself_ , wanted to no longer feel like a fraud, and suddenly I was responsible for this guy whose life would never be the same.” Sam takes a deep swallow from his glass. “The frontal lobe is responsible for things like movement, behavior, learning… So you know, I knew that his life would never be the same – all because of me.”

“But you saved his life, that means everything. He was still alive. Imagine the difference you must’ve made for his loved ones, that their brother or son or husband didn’t come home in a casket.”

“Yeah,” Sam agrees, “that’s what eventually set me straight as well. His… his dad called me, he was in Rammstein by then… and suddenly his dad was on the phone telling me how grateful they were and not just he and his wife, Sullivan himself had a wife and two daughters and disabled or not… it made a difference for them, you know, that he was still alive. Just fucking living makes a difference.”

“See.”

“He lives around here now, in Idaho. He got in touch a few years later and invited me. I never went.”

“Do you want to go see him?” Bucky looks at him searchingly.

Sam shakes his head, avoiding his gaze. “What good would that do? Go see him just to make me feel better?”

“I don’t think it’s about you. He invited you so he’d probably be happy to see you and show you what he made out of his life.”

“But I’d only go to make me feel better… so no… we’re not going.” Sam shakes his head. “But thinking of Sullivan made me think, you know, if simply being alive, no matter how, makes a difference, how can I not save the people closest to me? Why didn’t I save my friends?”

“There were forces at work more powerful than you.” It sounds hollow even to Bucky. It’s what he’s been struggling with too. No matter what, he will always feel responsible for Steve’s death.

“That doesn’t make me feel better. I lost another friend,” Sam says quietly. “I thought I could save him, but I couldn’t.”

“It’s not your fault, Sam,” Bucky repeats, hoping that at some point he’ll get through to him.

“Doesn’t feel like it. Rescuing people, that’s what I signed up for. That’s what I trained for. That’s what I’m supposed to be good at. And yet… I still can’t save anybody for shit,” he says with finality.

Sam gets quiet and sullen afterwards, so Bucky suggest they head back to their room. When Bucky wakes up the same morning, Sam is gone and he finds a note on the bedside table. “Went out, be back.”

He doesn’t see Sam the entire day. Bucky finds a local place in town to buy a new tire for their car so that they won’t have to drive on the spare any longer and then wanders around the little town for an hour or two. He finds a manhole cover that declares Wallace, ID to be the center of the universe and snaps a picture of it.

Sam returns to their hotel room later that night. He’s sweaty and dirty but his eyes also looks a little less haunted.

“You okay?” Bucky asks carefully to which Sam only nods.

They head out in the morning. Bucky moves to hand the car keys back to Sam, but he only silently shakes his head and takes Bucky’s spot on the passenger seat. Bucky briefly considers asking Sam if really everything is okay but decides against it. If Sam wants to talk, he will.

Sam is silent during the entire ride and is looking out of the window while Bucky is driving. The silence isn’t uncomfortable and somehow Bucky can tell that Sam is processing something.

Spokane is less than 100 miles away and they make it into the city before noon. Bucky finds them a motel and then doesn’t know what to do. They’d agreed that this was to be their destination but it doesn’t feel like it is. They still haven’t scattered all of Steve’s ashes and Sam is clearly still working through some things. But that also makes it difficult to bring this up. Bucky decides to let Sam take the lead on this.

Bucky looks at a leaflet the receptionist had handed to him at check-in.

“Come on,” he tells Sam, who’s lying on his bed, staring at nothing. “There’s a gigantic red wagon not far from here,” Bucky tries to cajole him. “Should we look at one more giant thing before we call this quits?”

“Bucky,” Sam says quietly, getting up from the bed. “Remember when you said we should do this because you weren’t quite ready to fully say goodbye yet?”

“Yeah.”

“I’m not ready to say goodbye yet. Let’s drive on.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Bucky breaking his programming and escaping on Independence Day/Steve's birthday is taken from [Born on the Fourth of July (Freedom Rings) by showgirlsteve](https://archiveofourown.org/works/4011871).
> 
> Sam's background, the piece about feeling wretched about saving a guy with a headshot, is inspired by the story of a real-life marine corpsman, which was detailed in "The Fighters" by C. J. Chivers.

**Author's Note:**

> If you're interested in following their travels, [here's a map.](https://drive.google.com/open?id=1NK1pncXrihIlyKXlKgGQq3vPVPhJpBrd&usp=sharing)


End file.
